“Richmond ServiceDesk is a solid, reliable and flexible system which helps us serve our customers efficiently…because it offers us one version of the truth.”

Project backgroundIndependently-owned Tuffnells Parcels Express has a proud 100 year history offering next day business-to-business deliveries throughout the UK.

Tuffnells supports a fleet of more than 700 vehicles and 30 strategically located UK depots with comprehensive technical assistance. Evolving with the times, Tuffnells offers real time electronic proof of delivery, plus it supplies and supports the logistics systems used by more than 2000 regular customers to print their own labels and track consignments.

Overseeing this complex operation is Dave Dunhill, Technical Support Manager for Tuffnells. “My team supports all the infrastructure, including systems, and hardware. Our helpdesk has 13 staff; two first liners and then eight second liners who deal with more complex issues. We also have a team of three providing mobile support for mobile data capture and scanning devices. Everything is logged and tracked through Richmond ServiceDesk.”

As long time customer of Richmond Systems’ IT service and support technologies, Tuffnells upgraded to the latest, web-based version of the product when it was made available late in 2013. “There were a number of niggles, but this was more because it was a slightly different interface and layout. Richmond ServiceDesk is as good, if not better than the client version, all of the functionality we need has been retained, plus it offers the benefits and flexibility of being web-based,” says Dunhill.

“Richmond ServiceDesk is as good, if not better than the client version, all of the functionality we need has been retained, plus it offers the benefits and flexibility of being web-based.”

This has continued a journey of IT modernisation between Richmond Systems and Tuffnells which began in 2007. “Our business driver is to reduce the need for support, and when I joined nine years ago, we had a number of old manual systems bolted on top of each other which meant this goal was difficult to reach. When I scoped products, I liked Richmond’s ease of use and was immediately impressed by how much time they spent with us understanding the business, plus they let us visit their customers to see the technology in action.”

Benefits of Richmond ServiceDeskNow it is tracking and logging between 150-300 calls per day, Dunhill explains the benefits of using Richmond ServiceDesk.

“The mobile element makes a big difference to our mobile engineers. Because all the back end processing is done server side, the web client is very fast, plus it allows them to perform all the tasks they would usually carry out on the desktop.” Replacing the paper-based system for managing engineers has saved time and labour, as well as improving accuracy according to dunhill.

There are broader benefits to using web-based technology. “Because Richmond ServiceDesk is web-based, upgrades are much easier because they happen automatically across all devices. I like the fact it uses SQL server, so I can run queries easily, and every customer automatically gets added to our system.”

This point helps explains how Richmond ServiceDesk is instrumental in delivering a cohesive service to customers. Because the team works a shift rotation, there is often overlap between tickets and the team member fixing the issue. Because Richmond ServiceDesk centralises all information relating to each customer and incident, and allows it to be quickly accessed from any device in any location, customers have no need to repeat themselves, while the support team have all the information they need for fast and accurate problem resolution. Dunhill succinctly explains the benefit of this. “Richmond ServiceDesk helps improve our support because it offers us one version of the truth.”

The comprehensive tracking within Richmond ServiceDesk has also helped justify time and investment in work. “Because we can account for every action, we account for the time of the team, whether they are at head office or supporting technology remotely.”

The responsiveness of the Richmond Systems teams regarding customisation has also impressed Dunhill. “Working with Richmond Systems has allowed us to be flexible when we decide how to change our way of working. We have seen major modifications made in weeks rather than months.”

“Richmond ServiceDesk is a solid, reliable and flexible system which helps us serve our customers efficiently. The flexibility and ease of accessing useful performance information has helped us make management decisions which have improved departmental performance, including an improved shift workload balance to ensure all activity is not in our core hours,” concludes Dunhill.

Stay in touch

Subscribe to our newsletter for news and insights and we’ll give you access to two FREE guides:How To Get People Using Self-Service For IT Support5 Reasons To Urgently Review Your Service Desk Software